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Volume 17, Number 25
20 July 2012




Iluvien gains French approval
French regulators have granted marketing approval for Iluvien (Fluocinolone acetonide) for the treatment of diabetic macular edema considered to be unresponsive to available therapies, according to developer Alimera Sciences (Atlanta, Ga., USA).
Iluvien is a sustained release intravitreal implant that delivers 190 micrograms of fluocinolone acetonide for up to 36 months after implantation.
The French authorization is the fourth national approval in the EU, preceded by Austria, Portugal, and the UK, Alimera noted. Iluvien remains under investigation in the U.S.



Eye health takes a back burner
Almost 70% of people worldwide would prefer to lose 10 years of their life or to lose a limb than lose their eyesight, according to a nationwide poll. Yet less than one third of those polled take the basic steps necessary to preserve eyesight, according to the "Barometer of Global Eye Health" survey.
The opinion poll found reasons for not having an annual eye exam vary widely, said sponsor Bausch + Lomb (Rochester, NY, USA) in a press release. Among the findings: 75% of consumers would rather have their pay cut in half than have a permanent 50% decline in the quality of their vision; women were more likely than men to take steps to protect their vision, such as wearing sunglasses (81% vs. 77%), eating a healthy diet (82% vs. 75%), and refraining from smoking (79% vs. 73%); 65% said they had not visited an eye doctor because they did not have any symptoms, and 60% did not have an eye exam because they had clear vision. Perhaps most surprising, 44% believed there was no need for an eye exam unless there was a vision problem, and 42% believed that if vision is clear, eye health is intact.
Bausch + Lomb surveyed more than 11,000 people in 11 countries (Brazil, China, Germany, France, India, Italy, Japan, Russia, Spain, the UK, and the U.S.) and collaborated with more than 140 unpaid eye health professionals from 26 countries to construct the survey.



Systemic hypertension increases diabetic eye damage
A University of Georgia (Athens, Ga., USA) study has found systemic hypertension can lead to impaired vision in diabetic patients, the University said in a news release. Within the first 6 weeks of elevated blood pressure, the study found early signals of cell death in eyes of diabetic animals, the University said. Later, the tiny blood vessels around the optic nerve that nourish the retina and affect visual processing showed signs of decay as early as 10 weeks after diabetic animals develop hypertension. The researchers stated their study was the first to understand or explain why combining increased blood pressure with diabetes would hurt blood vessels in the eye.



Drinking water chemicals may affect vision
Prenatal and early childhood exposure to the chemical solvent tetrachloroethylene (PCE) found in drinking water may be associated with long-term visual impairments, particularly in the area of color discrimination, a new study led by Boston (Mass., USA) University School of Public Health (BUSPH) researchers found.
The researchers assessed visual functioning among a group of people born between 1969 and 1983 to parents residing in eight towns in the Cape Cod region of Massachusetts. The towns all had PCE in their drinking water because of pipes outfitted with a vinyl liner that was improperly cured. Previous studies have found associations between PCE exposure and cancer, the University said.
In this study, people exposed to higher levels of PCE from gestation through age 5 exhibited poorer color-discrimination abilities than unexposed people. Although estimates claim about 600 miles of pipes with PCE were installed in nearly 100 towns in the state, the pipes no longer leach the chemical. However, PCE is still "widely used in dry cleaning and metal degreasing solutions and is a common drinking water contaminant," the University said.



Josef Bille, PhD, developer of wavefront technology, receives Lifetime Achievement Award
The European Patent Office has named Josef Bille, PhD, as its Lifetime Achievement Award recipient, for his groundbreaking development of wavefront technology for laser eye surgery.
According to a news release, Dr. Bille was working on how to apply the power of lasers to medicine as far back as 1966.
Also this month: Dr. Bille was granted a patent in the U.S. that protects the refractive index shaping and phase wrapping technology he invented while working with Aaren Scientific (Ontario, Calif., USA). The company said it was using the technology "to create custom IOLs using a femtosecond laser to alter the optical characteristics of IOLs which have been implanted in a human eye."



Fred Hollows Foundation, U Melbourne enter partnership
The Fred Hollows Foundation (Sydney, Australia) and the University of Melbourne (Australia) have entered into a US$3 million partnership to "reduce diabetes-related blindness and combat chronic disease among indigenous Australians," the groups announced in separate press releases. The 3-year program will use internet and mobile technologies such as tablet PCs and mobile phones to provide accurate, low cost eye exams and coordinated diabetes and heart care to indigenous people in remote parts of the Northern Territory and Central Australia.



RegeneRx, Lee's Pharmaceutical enter licensing agreement
RegeneRx (Rockville, Md., USA) has granted Lee's Pharmaceutical (Hong Kong) rights to its thymosin beta 4-based products, including the company's RGN-259, RGN-352, and RGN-137 product candidates, in China (including Hong Kong and Macau) and Taiwan, the company said in a news release. RGN-259 is a sterile, preservative-free topical eye drop for ophthalmic indications, including dry eye. The other two products are outside ophthalmology.
Lee's will pay for all developmental costs associated with each product candidate. RegeneRx will provide TB4 to Lee's at no charge for a phase II ophthalmic clinical trial and will provide TB4 to Lee's for all other developmental and clinical work at a price equal to RegeneRx's cost. Terms of the deal estimate its total worth at up to US$3.6 million.



RESEARCH BRIEFS
  • A newly developed hydrophobic acrylic lens was comparable to those of state-of-the-art reference materials; these properties may resist the formation of posterior capsule opacification, according to a study. C. Pagnoulle and colleagues in Belgium compared the stability of a new polymer matrix to reference acrylic materials by testing for glistenings. The glistening test showed that the new material had greater stability under worst-case conditions than previous-generation hydrophobic acrylic materials. The in vitro bioadhesiveness tests showed that porcine LEC adhesion levels of the new material were intermediate with respect to the two reference hydrophobic materials. The study is published in Journal of Cataract & Refractive Surgery.
  • Supervised resident manual small incisional cataract surgery (MSICS) can result in excellent anatomic and visual outcomes. Appropriate wound construction is a frequently encountered difficulty, a new study says, so particular attention should be directed to this step by both trainers and trainees. F.C. Decroos and colleagues retrospectively analyzed resident MSICS by those unfamiliar with the technique (i.e., the first 10 cases) at Duke University Eye Center. Of the 30 cases reviewed, mean pre-op logMAR was 1.8 that improved to 0.2 at final follow-up. The most frequent intraoperative adverse events were wound leak requiring intraoperative suturing (33%), vitreous loss (6.7%), and capsulorhexis radialization (6.7%). Transient corneal edema was the most frequent (56.7%) early post-op minor complication. Two major complications occurred that required wound revision in one eye and iridoplasty in one eye. The study is published online ahead of print in International Ophthalmology.
NEW PRODUCT BRIEFS
  • Topcon Medical Systems (Oakland, NJ, USA) introduced the CL-300 Computerized Lensmeter to the U.S. and Latin American markets. The CL-300 includes an ultraviolet transmittance measurement function that provides "reliable measurement results for eyeglasses and sunglasses in the range of 0% to 100%. The new multifocal lens measurement ensures that mono- and multifocal lenses can be easily measured, and the CL-300 also features automatic detection for single and progressive lenses," Topcon said.



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